Sadness and Celebration

This week was emotional.  There was enough sadness to fill a large stadium.  A young man, maybe in his forties, came up to me and asked me if I could sing "Our House" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young.  Well, I managed to fumble through it, but he started to sob, uncontrollably.  I asked him what was wrong.  He said, he lost his wife of 25 years to uterine cancer two months ago, and that was their favorite song.  He cried and cried, and I could smell alcohol on his breath.  Whatever works.  I hugged him and he tipped me generously, and I said it wasn't necessary, but he insisted.  And so it goes.  He walked away, as I started my next song.
Music can tap into a source, a place of pain.  It can open a flood gate.
Music is not for the faint of heart.
Then there was the couple who approached me yesterday.  She was in a wheelchair, he pushing it.  I was singing "Ain't No Sunshine" by Bill Withers.  As I sang the man started singing back, call and response style.  At first I didn't notice it, but as he and his woman friend drew nearer, I definitely felt the connection.  Ain't no sunshine when she's gone.  Only darkness every day.  We sang back and forth to each other, I alternating with voice and harmonica.
It was the highpoint of my day.
Talk about connecting with your audience.
The couple was from Virginia and they were visiting Philly.  They were celebrating two months of marriage.  They had known each other for 26 years.  He had become a drug addict and she had hung in there with him, through all the hell and rehab, all those years.  Finally he had become sober, and she had married him as a reward.  I could feel the love vibrating from them.  Twenty-six years.  Talk about a test of their love for each other.
Both encounters made me feel grateful for what I have.  A talent to share and someone to love.
What else is there?

Free Insider Tips--Not To Be Taken Lightly

Singing and playing on the streets gives you the advantage to receive a variety of privileged information from passers-by.  I'm not sure exactly why they chose me to share these insider tips with.  I think some genuinely care and want to save me from impending doom.  Three weeks ago a man who spends his days in the park told me that they world was going to end the following week and that I shouldn't worry because he had reserved a place on the boat for me and my wife and that we were safe from the apocalypse.  He spoke in tongues part of the time, so some of the pertinent details were lost in translation, but I for the most part, I understood that we'd be o.k. 
Well, we're all still here, three weeks later.  I had packed my bags for nothing.  But better safe than sorry.
Yesterday, however, was unsettling.  A young man listened to an original song I was singing called "August Sky" about the stars above and infinity and the endless beauty of the Perseids shower on a summer night in Maine.   The man smiled and politely waited till I ended the song before speaking.  He made small talk about the song, but then asked me about what I believed in.  I told him stars, infinity, boundless beauty, that I'd like to think my stepson Jonathan, who died two years ago, was among those stars, his soul now part of the endless universe.  The man launched into a canned speech about accepting Jesus Christ as my savior.  I told him I thought Christ was cool, as well as Buddha, Paramahansa Yogananda, Ghandi, among others.  He told me Christ was the only true prophet.  Instantly I was sucked into a cauldron of the old argument I've heard so many times, that his way is the only way and everyone else was going to hell.  I could kick myself, every time I get blindsided by this line of thinking.  I'm pulled in and find myself going in circles with no way out.  I try to be polite and respectful.  I try to ease my way out, but religious bullies won't let you breath.  Finally, as I could feel him becoming frustrated with my pigheadedness, he shrugged and said he was just trying to help me and he felt bad for me that I would be going to hell.  I said thanks, and maybe we would finish our discussion at some later time, maybe in heaven.  I told him I had to get back to work and wished him a good day.  He shook his head in frustration and walked away. 
Like the apocalypse, I hope this information also turns out to be not true.  Me going to hell, that is.  I don't handle heat very well.  On the other hand, it might be interesting to see who else shows up there.  I could always start a band.

Bumping Through This Thing Called Life

There's a wonderful film out there about busking called "Once."  The soundtrack is fabulous, rich with painful but beautiful songs about love and hurt and how we all bump through life in spite of it.  The acting is fresh and spontaneous.  It gives the viewer an interesting view into the life of a busker in Ireland.  I'd recommend it highly.
It's also a love story.  Strangely the characters never address each other with names and they're listed in the credits as boy and girl.  Maybe that's to remind us of our anonymity.  We think we know each other on this path, but ultimately we are all alone.
Last night I was playing on Chestnut Street.  It's a very interesting experience.  I start playing at 8 PM, when it's still light out.  It's a laid-back feeling at that time.  Almost family-friendly.  People are still out with their children and just beginning to digest their dinner.  It's still an all-ages crowd.  Shortly after I started playing a very thin woman walked up to me with a huge but worn smile.  She seemed very sweet but a bit rough around the edges, like she'd experienced a little bit more of life than most of us.  She stood and listened, smiling constantly.  At the end of my song she said she really liked my voice and what I was doing.  I thanked her.  She then said that she was a singer, too, and had been compared to Janis Joplin.  Well, Janis happens to be one of my favorite singers, mostly because of her energy and grittiness and how she lived her short life on the edge till the very end, burning quickly and hotly, like a comet.  Anyway, I took a chance and said, "That's cool.  Would you like to sing something?"  She lit right up.   We agreed on Bob Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind."  Her voice was just as rough as her appearance, deep and gravelly, perhaps from too much hard living.  She shut her eyes when she sang and belted out her song, not quite sure of the lyrics, but filling in where necessary.  A true performer.  We sang a few more parts of songs, as she really didn't know all the lyrics to any one song.  She told me her name and then pulled out her state-issued i.d. card to prove it.  She said she was Irish and her name was Danny, Daniella.  Like Danny Boy, she said.  Pure Irish and proud of it.  I played a few more songs, then she said it was her last night in Philadelphia, and that she was alone.  She had been alone and lonely all her adult life.  She wondered if she would ever find love or someone to share her life with.  We talked about how we are all alone in many ways; we enter this world alone, often spend our lives alone, even if we're surrounded by friends and family, and then we leave this world alone.  There was a depressing pause in our conversation and I began to noodle around on the guitar softly.  Then she grabbed her ziplock bag of belongings and smiled.  She shook hands.  The lost look in her eyes got to me.  Deeply.   Her worn and tired smile.  I wondered where she was going to sleep tonight.  Under what circumstances.  And where her path would lead her after Philadelphia.
There are no happy endings.  Even the film "Once" ends on a note where we all end up sometimes not realizing our dreams entirely and love can be a compromise.
It's the next morning.  I slept in a warm bed last night after busking.  There's food in the fridge.  I live with the woman I love. 
I wonder where Daniella is right now....